Cybersecurity

"Some Motorola automated license plate reader surveillance cameras are live-streaming video and car data to the unsecured internet where anyone can watch and scrape them, a security researcher has found. In a proof-of-concept, a privacy advocate then developed a tool that automatically scans the exposed footage for license plates, and dumps that information into a spreadsheet, allowing someone to track the movements of others in real time.

Matt Brown of Brown Fine Security made a series of YouTube videos showing vulnerabilities in a Motorola Reaper HD ALPR that he bought on eBay. As we have reported previously, these ALPRs are deployed all over the United States by cities and police departments. Brown initially found that it is possible to view the video and data that these cameras are collecting if you join the private networks that they are operating on. But then he found that many of them are misconfigured to stream to the open internet rather than a private network.

“My initial videos were showing that if you’re on the same network, you can access the video stream without authentication,” Brown told 404 Media in a video chat. “But then I asked the question: What if somebody misconfigured this and instead of it being on a private network, some of these found their way onto the public internet?” "

https://www.404media.co/researcher-turns-insecure-license-plate-cameras-into-open-source-surveillance-tool/

#CyberSecurity #Privacy #Surveillance #USA #LicensePlateReaders #ALPRs #DataProtection